Any Chicago Bears fan would tell you right away. Hand the fridge a football, and get the hell out of the way!
If all we’re talking is half an inch, it shouldn’t be too hard to just bash the front bits in by that much. A sledge and some elbow grease is all.
You should check with the manufacturer, if they still exist, to make sure no freon tubes or asbestos or nuclear reactors or flux capacitors are in that half inch or the crumple zone behind it.
Halh inch?!
I thought you said 3 inches.
Even an inch in from the front shouldn’t be a problem. That’s about the hinge depth (from what I’ve seen), so you are probably safe.
Get out the Sawzall!!!
(use appropriate saftey precautions)
Is it possible to dismantle the fridge with screwdriver and pliers etc. Not with sawzall. A couple months ago I dismantled an old built-in oven that I had replaced. It was basically sheet metal held together with screws. Once I had it all apart I put in in the trash can and the garbage man picked it up. If you keep the motor and cooling coils together you can probably do this without releasing freon to the atmosphere. Freon itself is not toxic except if you get to much in a room there is no air to breathe. But there would not be enough in a fridge for this to be a problem. Try your best to recycle the freon so it doesn’t get released into the atmosphere. But I would be concerned about the fiber glass insulation. You probably want to wear a mask and gloves when handling this.
Is the fridge old enough to be metal? Or is it the newer plastic stuff?
If it is metal, I’d say the sledgehammer option should work, but rather than beating on the sides, I’d crease the top and bottom, then the back to get it to “fold in” on itself.
The freon should be removable. I’d check the yellow pages for people who do refrigerator repair and ask for a couple of estimates to get the freon drained. After that, any destructive action is fair game.
Chances are that the freon is long gone. The fridge I owned before the last one died as well, and the prognosis from the refrigerator repair guys was that the freon leaked out due to rusted coils on the back.
You have already doomed the world, get out the saw have some fun on this, the last day.
Emilio, since you’ve already figured out that the fridge is stuck inside because the house is crooked, clearly the solution is to straighten your house back out. No sweat.
If I were you, I’d stop planning such elaborate picnics.
Sawing the refrigerator in half is all very well, but I prefer something with a little more flair, like the lion application of the Tarski-Banach Theorem 2 .
Following their formula, deconstruct the fridge and reassemble it into an identical fridge half the size. Alakazam!
Move away and change your name. Leave no forwarding address.
Problem solved!
If you do plan to cut it with the Sawzall, here’s a page about removing old oil tanks that might have some helpful tips on cutting:
http://www.hammerzone.com/archives/hvac/oil_furnace/tank_removal/from_basement.htm
As another option, you could try looking for a place selling an even larger fridge that offers free delivery and instalation (so you can remove the old fridge while they bring in the new one) and a handy no-hassle return policy. Of course, if the same guys that installed it come to take it out, might be best to arm yourself (and maybe wear some protective gear) before they arrive.
You’d probably need a special blade for the Sawzall. You know, for the smaller cuts.
You could clean out its guts and make it into an aquarium.
But really, after removing the door, you could easily just cut in a plane parallel to the open face of the fridge, just a few inches back. That should make the fridge narrow enough in the longwise direction, AND avoid cutting up any of the junk in the back.
If it’s an old fridge, I seriously doubt there is anything to worry about cutting it lengthwise. No freon coils are built into the sides of the fridge, the coils and fan unit are in the back. The freezer may have coils, but most likely is a fan unit as well. If the coils are embedde, you may be able to see them.
First, releasing the freon most certainly isn’t going to kill him immediately. Sure, it may be enhancing a slow death to the planet, but nothing personal to him. When Walmart used to sell the small cans of freon for auto AC recharging, kids in my old high school would inhale them all the time. They are an oxygen inhibitor, very similar to sniffing glue. It’s definitely not a smart thing to do though.
I would vote for the BFH. That’s a big… err… hammer. We are talking about a 6-8lb maul. About the only problem would be if the basement ceiling is too low to get a good swing.
Using the hammer will allow better uses for the wench.
Arrgh! You can cut it effectively without even going near the freon coils! Its a non-issue.
[list=1]
[li]Lay it on its back[/li][li]Remove door.[/li][li]Hi Opal. { It is not actually necessary to 'Hi Opal" when working with the fridge. But it helps.}[/li][li]Fill with water.[/li][li]HEY-PRESTO! New bathtub.[/li][li]Universal Rejoicing! You’re finally taking up bathing![/li][/list=1]
TP, that’s what I said early in this thread. Just cut off the front.
E Lizard, let us know what you end up doing. I, for one, am dying of curiousity.
Try putting it inside your freezer and take it outside and then remove it from the freezer. Your freezer should be small enough to fit through the door.
If you are still worried about releasing freon, you can pinch the copper tubing on each side of the compressor before you do anything. The loss of freon would be reduced.
The unit is assembled like this:
A compressor/motor is installed in the outer shell. The copper tubing is short and open at the ends.
Insulation is installed in the outer shell
The inner shell is installed inserted into the outer. The inner shell has the tubing zigzagged around it. When inserting it, the ends of its copper tubes, the end of the thermostat tube and the wire to the light are guided though holes in the outer shell to the compressor compartment.
The inner and outer shells are screwed together under the door seal. If you peel back the door seal, you should see the screw heads. There may be a few additional screws, but these should be relatively easy to identify.
All hardware (shelf brackets etc.) is added to the inner shell (and usually not connected to the outer shell.
The copper tubes are joined and soldered.
Wires are connected.
The unit is charged.
You may be able to pinch the tubing, cut it in the middle of the pinch, and perform the reverse of the above. Now you will have a smaller inner shell, which should fit thru the door, an emply outer shell, which should mash like cheese, and be easily removed.